Here are some ways to make a difference to the world, using Tim Berners-Lees as an example: A World Wide Web of Ideas.

My take on the key concepts are:

Altruism – giving something away returns far more, and enables more people, in the long run.

Influence – a personal story attracts more attention than the best message-managed PR gloss.

Freedom – the freedom to explore ideas is a …

Reflecting on my current feature post Businesses that have persistent IT emergencies:

Most businesses are not ready for innovation. Or indeed the latest technology, the latest practices, … At least, not until they get the basic basics right first.

The basics being:

Who are you?
What are you about?
What do you do?
Why are you doing it?
How are you doing it?
Are you doing it effectively?
Are you doing it well?
Is your work …

The demand for innovation (the myriads of definitions thereof) is certainly out there more so than ever before, judging by the magazines and media. I am talking about business innovation here – that is new ways to design, run and “be” a business.

I predict that increasingly many colleges and universities will start offering degree programmes and qualifications in “Innovation”. It will be interesting to see the different approaches.

Notable …

A wonderful hat tip to the ingenuity of humans.

Fun pics from Dark Roasted Blend.

Imagination is more important than knowledge. The purpose of human life is to serve and to show compassion and the will to help others. Creativity is the ability to introduce order into the randomness of nature. Life is an exciting business and most exciting when it is lived for others. You cannot do much about the length of your life, but you can do a lot about its …

This fun little ad epitomises “play” to me. It is that sense of continual wonderment at the world, of newness, of conscious engagement with the smallest of things, and the simplest of the stuff that surrounds us. It is being awake to the moment.

You want to be more innovative, more creative? Try and live like this everyday. …

Some interesting insights into how Google works with its own people; in Google’s Lunchtime Betting Game by Noam Cohen of the New York Times.

I got this nice collapsible crate not to use as a crate, but rather as a laptop tray.

I recently added more RAM to an older laptop, so I can use it for in-bed reading. The problem was, with the added RAM, the bottom of the laptop became scorchingly hot. I needed to put it on something.

Enter the nice collapsible crate. It was the right size. It was …

I had a nice day today – mostly spent lying in bed, reading (a novel), and dozing off in between chapters. Only slightly thinking about work… It’s the whole “we must have this done by Christmas” workload . Not that I am complaining!

In the afternoon, I got up and started a new painting. It has been a while. The canvases were piling up accusatively.

After …

I have been thinking and talking to friends and associates a bit recently about the in-between.

We are very good at compartmentalisation in our world today. Most things/concepts/services/people lie in their very own special boxes. Our job descriptions pigeonhole us neatly into what we do (and not a thing more).

There exists huge opportunities for those who can thrive in the in-between. The classic role is the …